Beati Paoli

by Luigi Natoli

part two, chapter 23

The birro, not doubting his blow, and expecting that announcement had arranged everything for his departure, for there was nothing left for him to do in Messina; and he had taken leave of the Duchess. From the keeper's official news of Blasco's death, he hastened to mount on horseback and to get away from Messina, fearing that that sudden death would bring him some annoyance.

He then left Porta Reale, with the intention of earning the coastal road and boarding in Milazzo on some tartan or felucas departing for Palermo, and making his tracks lose. Therefore he had thought, coming to Spatafora or some other country on the road, to lay his disguise of abbot and take up village clothes.

As he went out, the caretaker delivered to the servant of woman Gabriella the card of Blasco, whose reading put a tumult in the soul of the lady; at first he whispered with joy, then repented of his step. Fearful curiosity dominated joy and repentance. So his thoughts were well founded; what had happened? His first impulse was to send to ask for news, but the reflection that came after it dissuaded it; prudence foreshadowed the inconveniences that could arise from that step. First of all, Blasco was a prisoner by order of the king, and she, who did everything to regain the benevolence of Vittorio Amedeo, would certainly have lost what she had earned, doing something that might displease him; on the other hand, having painted Blasco in gloomy shades, going to visit him seemed a real and unjustified contradiction.

What to do?

He sent for Mattagryphon's caretaker on a pretext, to know, at least, something about the danger that Blasco ran and was not less frightened of him, when he learned of the poisoned supper sent by the abbot that the caretaker believed to be a good friend of the prisoner. Ah! would have wanted it in the hands of that devil's pretonzolo, to let him pass, forever, the will to experience his infernal poisons on the knights! But he would have found it! Donna Gabriella shook at this idea and mentally thanked the sky that Matteo Lo Vecchio had left.

If the caretaker had found him, who could have predicted what would come out?

The Duchess gave a bag full of money to the caretaker, recommending him to keep the deepest secret about all that had happened, and not to pass on to the prisoner other foods than those who would come from her house, with his servants. He thus thought that other pitfalls could not be set against Blasco's life, and he believed by this that he would put his conscience at peace from those remorse that stinged her from time to time. In prison, he was fine, but killing him with a betrayal of that kind, no! His heart rebelled. And then!

He did not dare to scan into the depths of his heart, in which different and opposite feelings were waving and bumping.

The caretaker had returned to the castle as happy as a passover, because he had understood that between the knight and the lady there had to be something secret; and that it was in their interest to obtain that on this secret there be a deep silence; this constituted for him, the only witness, a small source of gain. You had to take advantage of it.

At midday he brought lunch to the prisoner.

Blasco looked at him suspiciously: But the keeper smiled and said to him,

"This your lordship can eat it without fear of surprises. It's from someone..."

Was he telling the truth? What if it's a new trick? Blasco poured wine into a glass and said to the keeper:

"Drink!"

The caretaker did not hesitate, and emptied the glass in one breath.

"Is he happy? Do you want me to eat anything?"

"No: You can go."

Truly Blasco was hungry as wolves and the desining was tantalizing; the safety of the caretaker, his quiet appearance, took away from him any doubt, so that, overcoming every repugnance, he began to eat.

So the days passed, one after the other without any news: Blasco was waiting for a judgment that was not coming; it seemed that the king had forgotten it, and the Marquis of St. Thomas no longer talked about it, because Gabriella woman, in turn, did not make the slightest mention of Blasco. On the contrary, he had manifested himself among the king's guards, a current favorable to him. The three wounded, who were slowly healing and were able to speak and take care of something, had taken Blasco's defenses, who had behaved loyally and riderly and had shown exceptional value. It seemed to them mortifying and dishonorable that a knight, for the mere fact that he had fought with the king's guards, and had won them, was punished by others: It was like an affront to them; it was an intrusion that violated the laws of cavalry; it was an unintended, unsolicited defense of which they had reddened and felt disrespectful.

The same Marquis of Tournon, their captain, had to confess that locking a knight like Blasco da Castiglione in prison like an evildoer was something that did not honor the king's justice and he had been disappointed with the Marquis of St. Thomas, but he had stuck in his shoulders. The edicts made no exception; even the king admired the value of that young man, but he had to give examples.

The answer did not suit the guards. Champ-aux-arbres, who was the least seriously injured, and at the same time the most enterprising and determined, said:

"Forgive me! to get out of a castle you do not need a sheet of paper with the stamp of his majesty... Let's do it ourselves!"

They ordered a little conspiracy upon it, which they swore to keep the deepest silence. First of all, it was necessary to relate to the prisoner, which was a little difficult for them, who were not priests or friars. But Champ-aux-arbres had put himself on the spot, because of the difficulties.

One morning Blasco saw a mysterious note of a writing different from that of the first, and a content that did not seem of the same soul.

The note said:

Lord,

"Your imprisonment strikes and mortifies people who honor the value. Trust and hope."

This card wrapped around a stone fell on Blasco's knees, while sleeping, and woke him up. He looked at the window, from where it had passed, wondering that he never thought that that window could protrude on some road. He thought of looking out and seeing; the window was tall and equipped with large bars; to get there he had to drag the table, put on the stool and mount it. Blasco noticed that he was giving above the outer walls of the fortress, of which he already saw the blackbirds. He judged that he should be in a tower, and that the height from the window to the shelf running around the blackbirds should be at least twenty palms. He did not understand, however, whether there was a court between the tower and the walls, or whether what he thought was a shelf or a passerby was instead a terrace that came under the tower. As Blasco looked, he saw on one side a soldier, with a rifle on his shoulder, walking slowly, until under the window, where he came and looked at you; he turned and turned back.

If the stone had entered from the window, it must have been thrown from that terrace or passerby, and of course the soldier who was walking could not be foreign to the fact, indeed it must have allowed. He waited for the soldier to return to the window, and by gluing his face between the bars he called him with such a strong pssi, that he lifted up his head earnestly toward him.

Blasco shoved his hand out, and made him a gesture that could be a greeting and a thank you. The soldier answered with a gesture of his shoulders, which could mean:

"I don't know anything, and I don't have anything to do with it!"

At midday, the caretaker brought him lunch as usual; Blasco was in a good mood, and sat down at the table with his soul willing to do honor to the desinare. He took the bread to cut it: But the knife hit something hard and hard. Stupid opened the bread and found a small triangular file there.

His amazement turned into a great joy; that file represented his deliverance. He hid it under the straw and put himself to eat, but the joy took away his appetite.

His head began to develop escape plans. He would saw the bars and jump down to the terrace. The soldier was certainly a friend who would turn a blind eye and both of them, so that there was no subjection. He would return to Palermo, where he thought he was safe; or, also, he would take up the sea if necessary, but before leaving he would run to thank woman Gabriella, since he did not doubt that it owed her that miraculous and providential sending. You have to wait for the night to get to work.

The caretaker noticed that Blasco had eaten very little, yet he was not sad, in fact he had in his eyes a certain I don't know that.

"I'm coming to tell you something," he told Blasco. "What news?"

"The order has come to the castle that your lordship be brought to the castle of Termini; today with an armed felucas that departs in an hour..."

Blasco paled: His escape vanished, his plans faded away, everything shattered, was annihilated. The castle of Termini was a formidable fortress, overlooking the sea, and detached almost from the city by large moats, from which you could not escape without having a pair of wings. It meant a relegation of which the term could not be predicted.

What to do?

That file, which had opened his heart to the deepest hopes, now became a useless tool for him, but those who cared to send the letter and the file could still be useful. Who was it? Donna Gabriella? He didn't doubt it. The diversity of writing and the new way in which the card had come and the form of it did not exclude that the lady was not the secret inspiring.

He had to write, and he wrote a very simple note:

"In an hour, I leave for the castle of Termini, where I am relegated. I thank you for everything, and I am devoted and grateful to you for life."

"Bring this letter to the lady you know," he said to the caretaker.

Shortly after, enclosed in a sedan, surrounded by soldiers, Blasco was transported to the navy to be boarded on the feluca which, on sails stretched out, moored in the harbor, was ready to stand out the darkness.

The news of this departure had spread immediately, and on the gate of the Fortress had called a crowd of curious, who wanted to see the handsome young knight, as he had beaten the guards of the king, those guards who, by their talents, for their bullies had come to hate the citizens. The young knight had become in popular fantasy a kind of avenger, on which had condensed the sympathies and admiration of all. To the news that they sent him into a castle, with an unusual rigor of which no one knew to be right, they grieved and disdained, considering that punishment almost as a challenge to the citizens, an offense to the public feeling. Some began to murmur, the crowd followed the sedan, increasing more and more so that on arriving at the port it was increased by tightening and pushing on every side the soldiers, who struggled to make way, and who had to use the spades in order to open the sedan and let the young man out.

Blasco had glimpsed among the tendons of the porterina the crowd and had heard its murmuring, guessing from the tone its feelings, but he did not imagine that it was so dense, as he saw it disassembling. He had menacing faces and seemed to feel the scent of a riot. A smile and hope wandered on his face.

"Here it is! There he is!..." some voices shouted when they saw him.

"How beautiful it is!" exclaimed some people.

"Leave him. Let him go!..."

It was as the sign, as the watchword awaited; hundreds, thousands of voices repeated threatening:

"Let him go! Let him go!..."

An instinctive movement, like the flow of a tide, pushed and tightened that crowd upon the soldiers, to whom the spades became useless. They cried out:

"Back!... back... Order of the king!..."

But who listened to them? Who could stop the wave blown up by the storm?

"Let him go! Let him go!..."

Blasco was radiant; with his arms crossed he waited for the dissolution of that sudden manifestation of people: The soldiers, on the other hand, were pale and bite their lips for impotent repressed anger. The crowd took advantage of their embarrassment and impotence, surrounded them, separated them from each other, disarmed them, overwhelmed them, rejected them; Blasco remained alone.

"Fugga! fugga!" they shouted to him from all sides, and the gesture was added to the words: a wave of people dragged him through the village of Terranova, half destroyed because of the citadel, and, by the way of the walls, led him to the Imperial Gate, from where the road of the Duomo extended.

"Vessignoria fugga!..."

Blasco turned, sent a kiss to the crowd that had saved him, and a "Thank you" that came from his heart moved, and threw himself through the paths that from the road, penetrating between the groves of orange trees and olive groves, went up towards the hills.